Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners, particularly the characters taken from the animated series, Code Lyoko, and the television series, Torchwood. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.
Additional Disclaimer:Members of the British government and royalty are depicted from this point in the story forward.. Though most of the persons depicted are fictitious, the character of The Queen is not. However, the depiction of the Queen in this story should not in any way, shape, or form be construed as factual. The author has no knowledge of the Royal Family, and makes no attempt to pretend otherwise. The author intends no disrespect to The Queen, nor to the British Government, by their portrayal in this story.
She had never been in jail before, but this would forever be the nicest jail cell she had ever stayed in.
After the dust had settled, reinforcements arrived at the auditorium and took control of the situation. The Queen and Aelita were immediately removed from the scene; the Queen's Secretary rushed to the hospital, where he was admitted in grave condition. The entire time, Aelita waited for the white bubble of energy that signaled a Return to the Past, but it never came.
The army also rounded up Simon and the other SubDigitals, barricaded in their bus, Jim, Sissi and her father, Sophie and Randle Thorne. It took three burly soldiers to pull the woman off of the fallen choreographer. She had to be given a sedative to settle her down, and Thorne had to be taken to the hospital for massive trauma to his genital region.
Aelita was taken to Buckingham Palace. She was given a nice room and told to get some rest, because tomorrow would be a long day for her. The room was furnished with antiques hundreds of years old, and had classic works of art adorning the walls. This one room had more priceless historical treasures than any museum she had ever visited. But even with taking in the beautiful decor, she didn't miss the distinctive click of the lock turning, nor the shadow of two feet in front of the door. Yes, it was a very nice jail cell, but it was still a jail cell.
The next morning, she woke up and did her morning ablution. When she got out of the bathroom, she saw that clothes had been laid out for her. Someone must have gone to her hotel room and gotten her things while she slept, and set out a change for her.
Just as she finished dressing, there was a knock at the door. The lock turned and the door opened, and a woman stuck her head inside.
"Miss, if you're dressed, they're waiting for you now," was all she said before she slipped back out.
Aelita opened the door and saw the woman standing a few paces away. Next to the door was a soldier, her guard. The woman gestured for the girl to follow.
"This way, Miss; the Queen is waiting."
Aelita followed the woman, the guard falling in step behind her. She was led a short way to an elegant room. Inside was a table and chairs, with breakfast dishes set on it. Sitting at the table was the Queen and a man Aelita had not yet met.
"Please, join us, Aelita," the Queen said, "you must be famished."
Aelita entered the room and sat at the table. The woman closed the door, giving them privacy.
"First of all," the Queen began, pouring Aelita a cup of tea, "let me give you Our Thanks. If your friends hadn't arrived, I would surely be dead, and the country in turmoil."
"Secondly, you are not under arrest. I thought it best to remove you from the limelight for a while so we could talk privately. I cannot ignore what happened last night, and from what little you have said, it may not be over. I need you to tell me everything you can about what happened last night, so I can protect my subjects from future attacks."
"Your Majesty, I wish I could," Aelita said as she sweetened her tea and took a bite of toast, "but you would never believe me if I did."
"Not believe that whatever was powering those things last night were using some form of quantum energy and matter," the man suddenly said, "that somehow, quantum beings overpowered and overrode the wills of some of the people involved? The only thing that surprises me is that it was terrestrial technology that did all this, not that it happened."
"This gentleman is from an organization called Torchwood," the Queen said, "the Torchwood Institute was founded years ago to research and defend against unusual threats to the Empire, and what happened last night surely counts as an unusual threat. I give you my Personal Word that everything you say here will be kept in strictest confidence."
Aelita looked at the Queen, then at the man. Sensing no guile in either of them, she began.
"Around nineteen ninety-four, my father, Franz Hopper, completed work on a quantum supercomputer..."
"No, we never thought anything was unusual," the police chief said to the army colonel, "we just figured that they were refurbishing the place, and people would start working there in a couple of months."
The Chief Of Police for the town of Bath was explaining to the colonel why no one had investigated the abandoned facility that suddenly blew up the previous evening.
"Surely you didn't think it strange when things started going in and out, but there was no one around?" the colonel asked.
"Not really," the chief replied, "there could have been a small crew working inside the installation and we never saw them come or go. It's not like they were doing anything illegal."
"As it turns out, they might well have been," the colonel said, "anyway, we'll be taking over the investigation from here. One of my men may be around to ask you some more questions."
With that, the colonel dismissed the police chief and turned to a lieutenant.
"Anything new to report?"
"We definitely traced the explosion to the main generator," the lieutenant said, "though I'll be damned if I can figure out what happened. The best preliminary guess is someone intentionally sabotaged it."
"Any clues?"
"No, sir. If someone did this, there would be body parts all over the room, the reaction was that fast."
"Curious."
Just then, a corporal ran up and saluted.
"Sirs! An investigation team from the Torchwood Institute just arrived!"
"Well, that doesn't surprise me," the colonel said, "very good, Corporal. Lieutenant, pass the word to give the Torchwood people full cooperation. I get the impression that if anyone's going to figure out what happened here, they will."
Sissi, her father, Jim and the SubDigitals were taken to an army garrison just outside of London. They were checked for injuries, given something to eat, and in the case of the adults, something to drink, and settled down for the night.
In the morning, they were taken one by one and questioned about last night's events.
"So, Miss Delmas," the soldier asked her, "why were you back stage last night?"
"I had a backstage pass," Sissi replied, "I was recording some footage for a news report I'll give when I return to Paris."
"So, you are a journalist?"
"No, I'm a junior high school student. I was given this as a school assignment, and I have a lot riding on it."
"Well, I'm afraid I'm going to have to confiscate your recordings," the man said, "we require them for our investigation."
"Great," Sissi grumbled, "and I was hoping to catch a break, too. Oh well, I guess my article will have to do."
"Article?"
"Yes, I also have to write a newspaper article for our school newspaper about the concert."
"I'll have to ask you for that as well. You see, we don't want anything getting out that might contradict the official story that last night was a terrorist incident."
"Oh, you mean it wasn't?"
The man smiled. "Of course it was. I must apologize, I generally assume that a member of the press would have ideas about an incident that are contrary to what we know happened."
"You make it sound like I thought it was an invasion from outer space or something," Sissi said.
"Yes," was all the man replied, "in any case, I still need to see your notes. If you like, I could go over it with you and maybe give you a little extra information to add to it, if you like."
Sissi beamed. "Oh thank you!"
Thank God for the innocence of children, the man thought.
Jeremie spent a sleepless night wondering how Aelita was doing, and whether there would still be a supercomputer in the factory come morning. Even though they had enough energy to infiltrate and destroy XANA's London computer, they didn't have enough energy to launch a Return to the Past. And the Queen saw more than enough to set about an inquiry, and she had her hands on one of the few people in the world who could tell her most everything she wanted to know.
But morning came and Ulrich reported all was quiet at the factory. The blond genius connected to Lyoko and Franz Hopper told him the same thing, and that he would have the program to repair Lyoko finished by that evening.
"It would be very interesting to find out how XANA transferred quantum energy over the Internet," the Torchwood man said after Aelita finished her story, "that technology might be very useful."
Aelita said nothing, she just took another bite of sausage.
"Aelita," the man said next, "most of what we research never makes it into the public domain. As a matter of fact, very little of it gets used at all. My main objective is to evaluate the potential danger this technology poses to England."
"If we're able to destroy XANA, it won't pose any danger at all," Aelita said.
"About that, why have you children been carrying this on so long," the Queen asked, "surely you could have turned your supercomputer off at any time and lived a normal life."
"In the beginning," Aelita replied, "Jeremie kept the computer on to rescue me. After he materialized me, we couldn't shut it down because I would die if it were. After that, it was so we could rescue my father. Now, it's not only my father, but William Dunbar as well."
"The young man that paid you a visit last night," said the Queen.
"That was XANA controlling him," Aelita replied, "you remember what he said about the boy screaming. William is trapped somewhere, but has knowledge of what XANA does. That's why we keep fighting."
"And to think some people say the French are cowards," the Queen said to no one in particular, "well, now that you have told us what you know, we shall return the favor in part. Your friend Jeremie was correct, this XANA must have been using some kind of computer in the Bath area. We received a report of a large explosion in a complex in Bath early this morning. Evidently, shipments have been coming and going to this complex for the last few months. Nobody noticed it until the explosion."
"Another thing," the Torchwood man added, "we've done a preliminary examination of one of the bug things, you called them Kankerlats? In any case, there was practically nothing in them other than servos to move the legs and body, but there was a circuit board we found that was very interesting. We were able to trace it back to New Mexico, in the United States. Interestingly enough, there was a massive explosion in a supposedly abandoned facility there. Care to comment?"
"That was probably the computer we found," Aelita said, "it was located in New Mexico."
"Any you said there was another one."
"In a jungle somewhere. I don't think we ever figured out exactly where."
"I suppose we can't convince you to walk away from this," the Queen said, "leave it to the adults and go back to being teenagers."
"We can't," Aelita replied, "even if we did, XANA would find us. He especially wants me, so he can draw out my father."
"I see," the Queen said, "we are still in the process of debriefing your friends; so, for now, I must ask that you remain here. I'll see to it someone shows you around. Once they've been processed, you'll all be free to go, I would only ask that you say nothing about XANA, and keep to the official story we will be releasing."
"That should be easy enough," Aelita said, "people would think I was crazy if I said anything about XANA."
"Maybe not as many people as you think," the Torchwood man said.
Aelita finished her breakfast, then the woman who escorted her returned. The pink haired girl thanked the Queen for breakfast and then left.
"So, Capt. Harkness, what do you think?" the Queen asked when they were alone.
"She's cute," he replied.
"Keep your mind on the situation at hand," Her Majesty admonished.
"My knee-jerk reaction is either go and take out their supercomputer, or have the French do it."
"Why do I sense a 'but.'"
"But, if we did that, we would probably destroy the only thing keeping the Earth safe," Capt. Harkness said, "it just boggles the mind that children have been actively protecting the world from this thing for so long. My next reaction would be to offer them a job."
"We may just, before this is over with," the Queen said, "anything else?"
"No. I'll have my people look for anything about Franz Hopper and quantum computing. It may help us get a handle on whatever this threat is."
"Then I'll leave it in your hands," the Queen said, "please keep me apprised of your progress."
"Yes, Your Majesty."
"More information is being released about the terrible incident at the SubDigitals concert last evening. Two men, Randle Thorne of Pickford, and Harcort Fenton Mudd, a.k.a. 'Harry' Mudd, attempted a coup against the Throne last evening. Killed were members of the Queen's Protective Detail, including eighty-six year old Bess Myerson, who was impersonating Her Majesty at the time. The Queen's Personal Secretary, Geoffrey Anders, is in critical but stable condition in the hospital."
"No word yet has been given about the mysterious persons who appeared to break up the attempt, but authorities are still conducting interviews. One of the perpetrators, Randle Thorne, was taken into custody and hospitalized due to injuries received during the incident, while police are still searching for Mr. Mudd."
"A spokesman for the Queen made this statement: Her Majesty deplores last night's attempt to undermine British sovereignty. She vows to dedicate the entire resources of the Government to track down and bring to justice all those who had a part in this deed. She also mourns for those tragically murdered, including Mrs. Bess Myerson, a member of Her Majesty's Protective Detail and a good friend for many years."
"Estimates put the death toll for last night's incident at over one hundred, both military and civilian. This is BBC News, London."